Did my first valve adjustment. Tips to bring back for other noobs and an odd thing.

This past weekend, I did the first valve adjustment I have performed on a bike. I am glad I did it, because my new-to-me-ly purchased bike was definitely in need of it. I am gonna kinda go into a bit of detail in case some other noobs like me stumble across this thread.

There are a few things I am very glad I did.
1. Spread it out and don't try to rush. I casually did this over the course of about 4 hours(and that's after getting down to the valve covers lol) so that I would avoid frustration and getting things messy.
2. Have a buddy to give you a hand if it is your first go. My roommate wanted to learn a bit about engine work so he was happy to tag along, and him helping made the process much less headache inducing.
3. have a nubby 10mm wrench. the long one couldn't reach all the spots because of the frame, so I am lucky I bought a set with nubby ones. To break the nuts I used that wrench along with a 10mm socket on the end to give me more leverage. Worked a treat.

Things I wish I did:
1. Buy gasket material that doesn't have the metal core. This stuff was a right b*tch to cut and I may have to go back and re-do it because there was a slight leak on my crankcase cover. I tightened the bottom bolt where it was leaking a little bit and I think it went away but we'll see.
2. Have the right size flathead. I wasn't totally prepared because we didn't have a screwdriver that would hold bits so I used my kit screwdriver which was a little bit loose and it made things a pain in the butt when tightening the valves.

Aside from the long timeframe, the valve adjustment went well. Pulling the crankcase cover did help get me an initial idea of how the valves should feel and how the cams should look when they are ready to adjust, so that will help me in the future. You can feel the valves kind of click when they are ready, and the cams are turned at a point where they are not compressing the valves. I am glad I pulled off the crankcase cover off for the learning experience.

Whoever set the valves before me, set them very tight and certainly not in spec. Of all of my valves, maybe 5 were in spec and most of the other valves were too tight. the locknuts were on waaaaaaay past specified torque which made them a huge pain to get loose. One of the rocker arms was flexing in my attempt to undo the nut, but I held it in place with another wrench a bit to avoid messing anything up. Anyways, got them adjusted and they are all good now. The bike starts right up with no more bad ticks and no trouble starting.

I did notice something with one of my valve sets, though. Out of all of my valves, one of my rocker arms and adjuster screw pairs was clearly of a different model. Is this something I should be concerned about at all? The engine is running perfectly fine so I don't think so, but I did think it was a bit odd. The cams also have a bit of wear indicative of the issues of this model, so I am glad I got the oil mod installed.

Also, since the bike was apart, I looked at my fuel filter. I am very very glad I did. It looked like the same filter that the bike shipped with, so I promptly made a run to the store for a replacement. I wish I'd have gotten a picture of it, it was discolored and disgusting. Certainly didn't aid any of the problems I've been having.

So yeah, there's my worthless bike update. Hopefully someone can take back some tips from this; and I am able to provide some now if anyone needs them.

Oh, here's those rocker arms so you can see what I'm talking about. You can also see the cam wear a little bit; a lot of it is just tiny dust particles that sat on the cam but yeah.
odd one:

regular one:

 

What is the Oil mod?

 

On the original Honda V4's, they had an issue with early cam wear due to manufacturing quality and partially due to oil delivery. Basically, I have replaced the stock head feed lines with larger ones so it gets a higher volume of oil, and fresh from the oil filter as well so it will help to reduce cam wear for my model. It screws on via a machined oil filter bolt to replace the original, and then a shorter oil filter screws onto that. from there, 2 braided lines run up the side of the engine and into the oil intakes between the carburetors.

 

There's a lot of mixed feelings about the oil mods out there. Also, some are better designs than others (the only one I would trust is the Dave Dodge one) - oil pressure isn't the only factor here since journal sizes can also play a role.

The older VF/VFR engines only have an issue with oil pressure at idle - even with an oil mod, the pressure is less than stellar sitting at idle speeds. If you have a bike with soft cam material, better to replace the cams first and foremost.

I had an '82 Magna with soft cams. I did the Dave Dodge oil mod kit. Would I do it again? Don't know. I have that '85 VF1000F I got over the winter that I'm showing some love to. I haven't decided if I'm going to put an oil mod kit on it or not.

Do some research before going that route anyways, then make the decision.

 

I went with the two line mod because it seemed to be well praised, and it is hard to find any other options out there nowadays. Unfortunately support for the old bikes is slowly dying out. Many resources can still be reached via wayback machine, though.

I may go about replacing the cams eventually, but with 20k on the clock they don't look bad so far. No pitting and only a tiny bit of the "streaking." No indentations or anything. They all look to be proper spec though. I don't have too much to compare to though. With the scarcity of replacement parts, I may end up buying a new engine for spare parts for probably just as much as I could find a set of cams, lol. I am not at that point though.

Within the next couple of years I will probably be upgrading back to a Yamaha FZ6 or maybe to a newer VFR. I don't want to drive the bike into the ground, but I don't want to throw all of my money into it either.

 

If your cams have lasted this long, chances are they are not the 'chocolate cams' of lore.

If you're really unsure, you can simply take them to get Rockwell Hardness tested at just about any Machine Shop.